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Table of Contents | |
Section | Page |
Start of eBook | 1 |
INTRODUCTORY NOTE | 1 |
LIFE IS A DREAM | 2 |
ACT I | 2 |
2 | |
ACT II | 16 |
ACT III. | 29 |
ACT IV. | 40 |
Pedro Calderon de la Barca was born in Madrid, January 17, 1600, of good family. He was educated at the Jesuit College in Madrid and at the University of Salamanca; and a doubtful tradition says that he began to write plays at the age of thirteen. His literary activity was interrupted for ten years, 1625-1635, by military service in Italy and the Low Countries, and again for a year or more in Catalonia. In 1637 he became a Knight of the Order of Santiago, and in 1651 he entered the priesthood, rising to the dignity of Superior of the Brotherhood of San Pedro in Madrid. He held various offices in the court of Philip IV, who rewarded his services with pensions, and had his plays produced with great splendor. He died May 5, 1681.
At the time when Calderon began to compose for the stage, the Spanish drama was at its height. Lope de Vega, the most prolific and, with Calderon, the greatest, of Spanish dramatists, was still alive; and by his applause gave encouragement to the beginner whose fame was to rival his own. The national type of drama which Lope had established was maintained in its essential characteristics by Calderon, and he produced abundant specimens of all its varieties. Of regular plays he has left a hundred and twenty; of “Autos Sacramentales,” the peculiar Spanish allegorical development of the medieval mystery, we have seventy-three; besides a considerable number of farces.
The dominant motives in Calderon’s dramas are characteristically national: fervid loyalty to Church and King, and a sense of honor heightened almost to the point of the fantastic. Though his plays are laid in a great variety of scenes and ages, the sentiment and the characters remain essentially Spanish; and this intensely local quality has probably lessened the vogue of Calderon in other countries. In the construction and conduct of his plots he showed great skill, yet the ingenuity expended in the management of the story did not restrain the fiery emotion and opulent imagination which mark his finest speeches and give them a lyric quality which some critics regard as his greatest distinction.
Of all Calderon’s works, “Life is a Dream” may be regarded as the most universal in its theme. It seeks to teach a lesson that may be learned from the philosophers and religious thinkers of many ages—that the world of our senses is a mere shadow, and that the only reality is to be found in the invisible and eternal. The story which forms its basis is Oriental in origin, and in the form of the legend of “Barlaam and Josaphat” was familiar in all the literatures of the Middle Ages. Combined with this in the plot is the tale of Abou Hassan from the “Arabian Nights,” the main situations in which are turned to farcical purposes in the Induction to the Shakespearean “Taming of the Shrew.” But with Calderon the theme is lifted altogether out of the atmosphere of comedy, and is worked up with poetic sentiment and a touch of mysticism into a symbolic drama of profound and universal philosophical significance.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
Basilio King of Poland. Segismund his Son. Astolfo his Nephew. Estrella his Niece. Clotaldo a General in Basilio’s Service. Rosaura a Muscovite Lady. Fife her Attendant.
Chamberlain, Lords in
Waiting, Officers,
Soldiers, etc.,
in Basilio’s Service.
The Scene of the first and third Acts lies on the Polish frontier: of the second Act, in Warsaw.
As this version of Calderon’s drama is not for acting, a higher and wider mountain-scene than practicable may be imagined for Rosaura’s descent in the first Act and the soldiers’ ascent in the last. The bad watch kept by the sentinels who guarded their state-prisoner, together with much else (not all!) that defies sober sense in this wild drama, I must leave Calderon to answer for; whose audience were not critical of detail and probability, so long as a good story, with strong, rapid, and picturesque action and situation, was set before them.
Scene I—A pass of rocks, over which a storm is rolling away,
and the sun setting: in the foreground, half-way down, a fortress.
(Enter first from the topmost rock Rosaura, as from horseback, in man’s attire; and, after her, Fife.)
Rosaura.
There, four-footed Fury,
blast
Engender’d brute,
without the wit
Of brute, or mouth to
match the bit
Of man—art
satisfied at last?
Who, when thunder roll’d
aloof,
Tow’rd the spheres
of fire your ears
Pricking, and the granite
kicking
Into lightning with
your hoof,
Among the tempest-shatter’d
crags
Shattering your luckless
rider
Back into the tempest
pass’d?
There then lie to starve
and die,
Or find another Phaeton
Mad-mettled as yourself;
for I,
Wearied, worried, and
for-done,
Alone will down the
mountain try,
That knits his brows
against the sun.
Fife (as to his mule).
There, thou mis-begotten
thing,
Long-ear’d lightning,
tail’d tornado,
Griffin-hoof-in hurricano,
(I might swear till
I were almost
Hoarse with roaring
Asonante)
Who forsooth because
our betters
Would begin to kick
and fling
You forthwith your noble
mind
Must prove, and kick
me off behind,
Tow’rd the very
centre whither
Gravity was most inclined.
There where you have
made your bed
In it lie; for, wet
or dry,
Let what will for me
betide you,
Burning, blowing, freezing,
hailing;
Famine waste you:
devil ride you:
Tempest baste you black
and blue:
(To Rosaura.)
There! I think
in downright railing
I can hold my own with
you.
Ros.
Ah, my good Fife, whose
merry loyal pipe,
Come weal, come woe,
is never out of tune
What, you in the same
plight too?
Fife.
Ay; And madam—sir—hereby
desire,
When you your own adventures
sing
Another time in lofty
rhyme,
You don’t forget
the trusty squire
Who went with you Don-quixoting.
Ros.
Well, my good fellow—to
leave Pegasus
Who scarce can serve
us than our horses worse—
They say no one should
rob another of
The single satisfaction
he has left
Of singing his own sorrows;
one so great,
So says some great philosopher,
that trouble
Were worth encount’ring
only for the sake
Of weeping over—what
perhaps you know
Some poet calls the
‘luxury of woe.’
Fife.
Had I the poet or philosopher
In the place of her
that kick’d me off to ride,
I’d test his theory
upon his hide.
But no bones broken,
madam—sir, I mean?—
Ros.
A scratch here that
a handkerchief will heal—
And you?—
Fife.
A scratch in quiddity,
or kind:
But not in ’quo’—my
wounds are all behind.
But, as you say, to
stop this strain,
Which, somehow, once
one’s in the vein,
Comes clattering after—there
again!—
What are we twain—deuce
take’t!—we two,
I mean, to do—drench’d
through and through—
Oh, I shall choke of
rhymes, which I believe
Are all that we shall
have to live on here.
Ros.
What, is our victual
gone too?—
Fife.
Ay, that brute
Has carried all we had
away with her,
Clothing, and cate,
and all.
Ros.
And now the sun,
Our only friend and
guide, about to sink
Under the stage of earth.
Fife.
And enter Night,
With Capa y Espada—and—pray
heaven!
With but her lanthorn
also.
Ros.
Ah, I doubt
To-night, if any, with
a dark one—or
Almost burnt out after
a month’s consumption.
Well! well or ill, on
horseback or afoot,
This is the gate that
lets me into Poland;
And, sorry welcome as
she gives a guest
Who writes his own arrival
on her rocks
In his own blood—
Yet better on her stony
threshold die,
Than live on unrevenged
in Muscovy.
Fife.
Oh, what a soul some
women have—I mean
Some men—
Ros.
Oh, Fife, Fife, as you
love me, Fife,
Make yourself perfect
in that little part,
Or all will go to ruin!
Fife.
Oh, I will,
Please God we find some
one to try it on.
But, truly, would not
any one believe
Some fairy had exchanged
us as we lay
Two tiny foster-children
in one cradle?
Ros.
Well, be that as it
may, Fife, it reminds me
Of what perhaps I should
have thought before,
But better late than
never—You know I love you,
As you, I know, love
me, and loyally
Have follow’d
me thus far in my wild venture.
Well! now then—having
seen me safe thus far
Safe if not wholly sound—over
the rocks
Into the country where
my business lies
Why should not you return
the way we came,
The storm all clear’d
away, and, leaving me
(Who now shall want
you, though not thank you, less,
Now that our horses
gone) this side the ridge,
Find your way back to
dear old home again;
While I—Come,
come!—
What, weeping my poor
fellow?
Fife.
Leave you here
Alone—my
Lady—Lord! I mean my Lord—
In a strange country—among
savages—
Oh, now I know—you
would be rid of me
For fear my stumbling
speech—
Ros.
Oh, no, no, no!—
I want you with me for
a thousand sakes
To which that is as
nothing—I myself
More apt to let the
secret out myself
Without your help at
all—Come, come, cheer up!
And if you sing again,
‘Come weal, come woe,’
Let it be that; for
we will never part
Until you give the signal.
Fife.
’Tis a bargain.
Ros.
Now to begin, then.
’Follow, follow me,
‘You fairy elves
that be.’
Fife.
Ay, and go on—
Something of ‘following
darkness like a dream,’
For that we’re
after.
Ros.
No, after the sun;
Trying to catch hold
of his glittering skirts
That hang upon the mountain
as he goes.
Fife.
Ah, he’s himself
past catching—as you spoke
He heard what you were
saying, and—just so—
Like some scared water-bird,
As we say in my country,
dove below.
Ros.
Well, we must follow
him as best we may.
Poland is no great country,
and, as rich
In men and means, will
but few acres spare
To lie beneath her barrier
mountains bare.
We cannot, I believe,
be very far
From mankind or their
dwellings.
Fife.
Send it so!
And well provided for
man, woman, and beast.
No, not for beast.
Ah, but my heart begins
To yearn for her—
Ros.
Keep close, and keep
your feet
From serving you as
hers did.
Fife.
As for beasts,
If in default of other
entertainment,
We should provide them
with ourselves to eat—
Bears, lions, wolves—
Ros.
Oh, never fear.
Fife.
Or else,
Default of other beasts,
beastlier men,
Cannibals, Anthropophagi,
bare Poles
Who never knew a tailor
but by taste.
Ros.
Look, look! Unless
my fancy misconceive
With twilight—down
among the rocks there, Fife—
Some human dwelling,
surely—
Or think you but a rock
torn from the rocks
In some convulsion like
to-day’s, and perch’d
Quaintly among them
in mock-masonry?
Fife.
Most likely that, I
doubt.
Ros.
No, no—for
look!
A square of darkness
opening in it—
Fife.
Oh, I don’t half
like such openings!—
Ros.
Like the loom
Of night from which
she spins her outer gloom—
Fife.
Lord, Madam, pray forbear
this tragic vein
In such a time and place—
Ros.
And now again
Within that square of
darkness, look! a light
That feels its way with
hesitating pulse,
As we do, through the
darkness that it drives
To blacken into deeper
night beyond.
Fife.
In which could we follow
that light’s example,
As might some English
Bardolph with his nose,
We might defy the sunset—Hark,
a chain!
Ros.
And now a lamp, a lamp!
And now the hand
That carries it.
Fife.
Oh, Lord! that dreadful
chain!
Ros.
And now the bearer of
the lamp; indeed
As strange as any in
Arabian tale,
So giant-like, and terrible,
and grand,
Spite of the skin he’s
wrapt in.
Fife.
Why, ’tis his
own:
Oh, ’tis some
wild man of the woods; I’ve heard
They build and carry
torches—
Ros.
Never Ape
Bore such a brow before
the heavens as that—
Chain’d as you
say too!—
Fife.
Oh, that dreadful chain!
Ros.
And now he sets the
lamp down by his side,
And with one hand clench’d
in his tangled hair
And with a sigh as if
his heart would break—
(During this Segismund
has entered from the fortress, with a
torch.)
Segismund.
Once more the storm
has roar’d itself away,
Splitting the crags
of God as it retires;
But sparing still what
it should only blast,
This guilty piece of
human handiwork,
And all that are within
it. Oh, how oft,
How oft, within or here
abroad, have I
Waited, and in the whisper
of my heart
Pray’d for the
slanting hand of heaven to strike
The blow myself I dared
not, out of fear
Of that Hereafter, worse,
they say, than here,
Plunged headlong in,
but, till dismissal waited,
To wipe at last all
sorrow from men’s eyes,
And make this heavy
dispensation clear.
Thus have I borne till
now, and still endure,
Crouching in sullen
impotence day by day,
Fife.
This is some Laureate
at a birthday ode;
No wonder we went rhyming.
Ros.
Hush! And now
See, starting to his
feet, he strides about
Far as his tether’d
steps—
Seg.
And if the chain
You help’d to
rivet round me did contract
Since guiltless infancy
from guilt in act;
Of what in aspiration
or in thought
Guilty, but in resentment
of the wrong
That wreaks revenge
on wrong I never wrought
By excommunication from
the free
Inheritance that all
created life,
Beside myself, is born
to—from the wings
That range your own
immeasurable blue,
Down to the poor, mute,
scale-imprison’d things,
That yet are free to
wander, glide, and pass
About that under-sapphire,
whereinto
Yourselves transfusing
you yourselves englass!
Ros.
What mystery is this?
Fife.
Why, the man’s
mad:
That’s all the
mystery. That’s why he’s chain’d—
And why—
Seg.
Nor Nature’s guiltless
life alone—
But that which lives
on blood and rapine; nay,
Charter’d with
larger liberty to slay
Their guiltless kind,
the tyrants of the air
Soar zenith-upward with
their screaming prey,
Making pure heaven drop
blood upon the stage
Of under earth, where
lion, wolf, and bear,
And they that on their
treacherous velvet wear
Figure and constellation
like your own,
With their still living
slaughter bound away
Over the barriers of
the mountain cage,
Against which one, blood-guiltless,
and endued
With aspiration and
with aptitude
Transcending other creatures,
day by day
Beats himself mad with
unavailing rage!
Fife.
Why, that must be the
meaning of my mule’s
Rebellion—
Ros.
Hush!
Seg.
But then if murder be
The law by which not
only conscience-blind
Creatures, but man too
prospers with his kind;
Who leaving all his
guilty fellows free,
Under your fatal auspice
and divine
Compulsion, leagued
in some mysterious ban
Against one innocent
and helpless man,
Abuse their liberty
to murder mine:
And sworn to silence,
like their masters mute
In heaven, and like
them twirling through the mask
Of darkness, answering
to all I ask,
Point up to them whose
work they execute!
Ros.
Ev’n as I thought,
some poor unhappy wretch,
By man wrong’d,
wretched, unrevenged, as I!
Nay, so much worse than
I, as by those chains
Clipt of the means of
self-revenge on those
Who lay on him what
they deserve. And I,
Who taunted Heaven a
little while ago
With pouring all its
wrath upon my head—
Alas! like him who caught
the cast-off husk
Of what another bragg’d
of feeding on,
Here’s one that
from the refuse of my sorrows
Could gather all the
banquet he desires!
Poor soul, poor soul!
Fife.
Speak lower—he
will hear you.
Ros.
And if he should, what
then? Why, if he would,
He could not harm me—Nay,
and if he could,
Methinks I’d venture
something of a life
I care so little for—
Seg.
Who’s that?
Clotaldo? Who are you, I say,
That, venturing in these
forbidden rocks,
Have lighted on my miserable
life,
And your own death?
Ros.
You would not hurt me,
surely?
Seg.
Not I; but those that,
iron as the chain
In which they slay me
with a lingering death,
Will slay you with a
sudden—Who are you?
Ros.
A stranger from across
the mountain there,
Who, having lost his
way in this strange land
And coming night, drew
hither to what seem’d
A human dwelling hidden
in these rocks,
And where the voice
of human sorrow soon
Told him it was so.
Seg.
Ay? But nearer—nearer—
That by this smoky supplement
of day
But for a moment I may
see who speaks
So pitifully sweet.
Fife.
Take care! take care!
Ros.
Alas, poor man, that
I, myself so helpless,
Could better help you
than by barren pity,
And my poor presence—
Seg.
Oh, might that be all!
But that—a
few poor moments—and, alas!
The very bliss of having,
and the dread
Of losing, under such
a penalty
As every moment’s
having runs more near,
Stifles the very utterance
and resource
They cry for quickest;
till from sheer despair
Of holding thee, methinks
myself would tear
To pieces—
Fife.
There, his word’s
enough for it.
Seg.
Oh, think, if you who
move about at will,
And live in sweet communion
with your kind,
After an hour lost in
these lonely rocks
Hunger and thirst after
some human voice
To drink, and human
face to feed upon;
What must one do where
all is mute, or harsh,
And ev’n the naked
face of cruelty
Were better than the
mask it works beneath?—
Across the mountain
then! Across the mountain!
What if the next world
which they tell one of
Be only next across
the mountain then,
Though I must never
see it till I die,
And you one of its angels?
Ros.
Alas; alas!
No angel! And the
face you think so fair,
’Tis but the dismal
frame-work of these rocks
That makes it seem so;
and the world I come from—
Alas, alas, too many
faces there
Are but fair vizors
to black hearts below,
Or only serve to bring
the wearer woe!
But to yourself—If
haply the redress
That I am here upon
may help to yours.
I heard you tax the
heavens with ordering,
And men for executing,
what, alas!
I now behold. But
why, and who they are
Who do, and you who
suffer—
Seg. (pointing upwards).
Ask of them,
Whom, as to-night, I
have so often ask’d,
And ask’d in vain.
Ros.
But surely, surely—
Seg.
Hark!
The trumpet of the watch
to shut us in.
Oh, should they find
you!—Quick! Behind the rocks!
To-morrow—if
to-morrow—
Ros. (flinging her sword
toward him).
Take my sword!
(Rosaura and Fife hide in the rocks; Enter Clotaldo)
Clotaldo.
These stormy days you
like to see the last of
Are but ill opiates,
Segismund, I think,
For night to follow:
and to-night you seem
More than your wont
disorder’d. What! A sword?
Within there!
(Enter Soldiers with black vizors and torches)
Fife.
Here’s a pleasant
masquerade!
CLO.
Whosever watch this was
Will have to pay head-reckoning. Meanwhile,
This weapon had a wearer. Bring him here,
Alive or dead.
Seg.
Clotaldo! good Clotaldo!—
CLO. (to Soldiers who enclose
Segismund; others
searching the rocks).
You know your duty.
Soldiers (bringing in Rosaura
and Fife).
Here are two of them,
Whoever more to follow—
CLO.
Who are you,
That in defiance of known proclamation
Are found, at night-fall too, about this place?
Fife.
Oh, my Lord, she—I
mean he—
Ros.
Silence, Fife,
And let me speak for
both.—Two foreign men,
To whom your country
and its proclamations
Are equally unknown;
and had we known,
Ourselves not masters
of our lawless beasts
That, terrified by the
storm among your rocks,
Flung us upon them to
our cost.
Fife.
My mule—
CLO.
Foreigners? Of
what country?
Ros.
Muscovy.
CLO.
And whither bound?
Ros.
Hither—if
this be Poland;
But with no ill design
on her, and therefore
Taking it ill that we
should thus be stopt
Upon her threshold so
uncivilly.
CLO.
Whither in Poland?
Ros.
To the capital.
CLO.
And on what errand?
Ros.
Set me on the road,
And you shall be the
nearer to my answer.
CLO. (aside).
So resolute and ready
to reply,
And yet so young—and—
(Aloud.)
Well,—
Your business was not
surely with the man
We found you with?
Ros.
He was the first we
saw,—
And strangers and benighted,
as we were,
As you too would have
done in a like case,
Accosted him at once.
CLO.
Ay, but this sword?
Ros.
I flung it toward him.
CLO.
Well, and why?
Ros.
And why? But to
revenge himself on those who thus
Injuriously misuse him.
CLO.
So—so—so!
’Tis well such
resolution wants a beard
And, I suppose, is never
to attain one.
Well, I must take you
both, you and your sword,
Prisoners.
Fife. (offering a cudgel).
Pray take mine, and
welcome, sir;
I’m sure I gave
it to that mule of mine
To mighty little purpose.
Ros.
Mine you have;
And may it win us some
more kindliness
Than we have met with
yet.
CLO (examining the sword).
More mystery!
How came you by this
weapon?
Ros.
From my father.
CLO.
And do you know whence
he?
Ros.
Oh, very well:
From one of this same
Polish realm of yours,
Who promised a return,
should come the chance,
Of courtesies that he
received himself
In Muscovy, and left
this pledge of it—
Not likely yet, it seems,
to be redeem’d.
CLO (aside).
Oh, wondrous chance—or
wondrous Providence!
The sword that I myself
in Muscovy,
When these white hairs
were black, for keepsake left
Of obligation for a
like return
To him who saved me
wounded as I lay
Ros.
The capital?
CLO.
Ay, the capital; and
ev’n
That capital of capitals,
the Court:
Where you may plead,
and, I may promise, win
Pardon for this, you
say unwilling, trespass,
And prosecute what else
you have at heart,
With me to help you
forward all I can;
Provided all in loyalty
to those
To whom by natural allegiance
I first am bound to.
Ros.
As you make, I take
Your offer: with
like promise on my side
Of loyalty to you and
those you serve,
Under like reservation
for regards
Nearer and dearer still.
CLO.
Enough, enough;
Your hand; a bargain
on both sides. Meanwhile,
Here shall you rest
to-night. The break of day
Shall see us both together
on the way.
Ros.
Thus then what I for
misadventure blamed,
Directly draws me where
my wishes aim’d.
(Exeunt.)
SCENE II.—The Palace at Warsaw
Enter on one side Astolfo, Duke of Muscovy, with his train: and, on the other, the Princess Estrella, with hers.
Astolfo.
My royal cousin, if
so near in blood,
Till this auspicious
meeting scarcely known,
Till all that beauty
promised in the bud
Is now to its consummate
blossom blown,
Well met at last; and
may—
Estrella.
Enough, my Lord,
Of compliment devised
for you by some
Court tailor, and, believe
me, still too short
To cover the designful
heart below.
Ast.
Nay, but indeed, fair
cousin—
EST.
Ay, let Deed
Measure your words,
indeed your flowers of speech
Ill with your iron equipage
atone;
Irony indeed, and wordy
compliment.
Ast.
Indeed, indeed, you
wrong me, royal cousin,
And fair as royal, misinterpreting
What, even for the end
you think I aim at,
If false to you, were
fatal to myself.
EST.
Why, what else means
the glittering steel, my Lord,
That bristles in the
rear of these fine words?
What can it mean, but,
failing to cajole,
To fight or force me
from my just pretension?
Ast.
Nay, might I not ask
ev’n the same of you,
The nodding helmets
of whose men-at-arms
Out-crest the plumage
of your lady court?
EST.
But to defend what yours
would force from me.
Ast.
Might not I, lady, say
the same of mine?
But not to come to battle,
ev’n of words,
With a fair lady, and
my kinswoman;
And as averse to stand
before your face,
Defenceless, and condemn’d
in your disgrace,
Till the good king be
here to clear it all—
Will you vouchsafe to
hear me?
EST.
As you will.
Ast.
You know that, when
about to leave this world,
Our royal grandsire,
King Alfonso, left
Three children; one
a son, Basilio,
Who wears—long
may he wear! the crown of Poland;
And daughters twain:
of whom the elder was
Your mother, Clorilena,
now some while
Exalted to a more than
mortal throne;
And Recisunda, mine,
the younger sister,
Who, married to the
Prince of Muscovy,
Gave me the light which
may she live to see
Herself for many, many
years to come.
Meanwhile, good King
Basilio, as you know,
Deep in abstruser studies
than this world,
And busier with the
stars than lady’s eyes,
Has never by a second
marriage yet
Replaced, as Poland
ask’d of him, the heir
An early marriage brought
and took away;
His young queen dying
with the son she bore him;
And in such alienation
grown so old
As leaves no other hope
of heir to Poland
Than his two sisters’
children; you, fair cousin,
And me; for whom the
Commons of the realm
Divide themselves into
two several factions;
Whether for you, the
elder sister’s child;
Or me, born of the younger,
but, they say,
My natural prerogative
of man
Outweighing your priority
of birth.
Which discord growing
loud and dangerous,
Our uncle, King Basilio,
doubly sage
In prophesying and providing
for
The future, as to deal
with it when come,
Bids us here meet to-day
in solemn council
Our several pretensions
to compose.
And, but the martial
out-burst that proclaims
His coming, makes all
further parley vain,
Unless my bosom, by
which only wise
I prophesy, now wrongly
prophesies,
By such a happy compact
as I dare
But glance at till the
Royal Sage declare.
(Trumpets, etc. Enter King Basilio with his Council.)
All.
The King! God save
the King!
Estrella (Kneeling.)
Oh, Royal Sir!—
Astolfo (Kneeling.)
God save your Majesty—
King.
Rise both of you,
Rise to my arms, Astolfo
and Estrella;
As my two sisters’
children always mine,
Now more than ever,
since myself and Poland
Solely to you for our
succession look’d.
And now give ear, you
and your several factions,
And you, the Peers and
Princes of this realm,
While I reveal the purport
of this meeting
In words whose necessary
length I trust
No unsuccessful issue
shall excuse.
You and the world who
have surnamed me “Sage”
Know that I owe that
title, if my due,
To my long meditation
on the book
Which ever lying open
overhead—
The book of heaven,
I mean—so few have read;
Whose golden letters
on whose sapphire leaf,
Distinguishing the page
of day and night,
And all the revolution
of the year;
So with the turning
volume where they lie
Still changing their
prophetic syllables,
They register the destinies
of men:
Until with eyes that,
dim with years indeed,
Are quicker to pursue
the stars than rule them,
I get the start of Time,
and from his hand
The wand of tardy revelation
draw.
Oh, had the self-same
heaven upon his page
Inscribed my death ere
I should read my life
And, by fore-casting
of my own mischance,
Play not the victim
but the suicide
In my own tragedy!—But
you shall hear.
You know how once, as
kings must for their people,
And only once, as wise
men for themselves,
I woo’d and wedded:
know too that my Queen
In childing died; but
not, as you believe,
With her, the son she
died in giving life to.
For, as the hour of
birth was on the stroke,
Her brain conceiving
with her womb, she dream’d
A serpent tore her entrail.
And too surely
(For evil omen seldom
speaks in vain)
The man-child breaking
from that living tomb
That makes our birth
the antitype of death,
Man-grateful, for the
life she gave him paid
By killing her:
and with such circumstance
As suited such unnatural
tragedy;
He coming into light,
if light it were
That darken’d
at his very horoscope,
When heaven’s
two champions—sun and moon I mean—
Suffused in blood upon
each other fell
In such a raging duel
of eclipse
As hath not terrified
the universe
Since that which wept
in blood the death of Christ:
When the dead walk’d,
the waters turn’d to blood,
Earth and her cities
totter’d, and the world
Seem’d shaken
to its last paralysis.
In such a paroxysm of
dissolution
That son of mine was
born; by that first act
Ast.
Such news, and from
such lips, may well suspend
The tongue to loyal
answer most attuned;
But if to me as spokesman
of my faction
Your Highness looks
for answer; I reply
For one and all—Let
Segismund, whom now
We first hear tell of
as your living heir,
Appear, and but in your
sufficient eye
Approve himself worthy
to be your son,
Then we will hail him
Poland’s rightful heir.
What says my cousin?
EST.
Ay, with all my heart.
But if my youth and
sex upbraid me not
That I should dare ask
of so wise a king—
King.
Ask, ask, fair cousin!
Nothing, I am sure,
Not well consider’d;
nay, if ’twere, yet nothing
But pardonable from
such lips as those.
EST.
Then, with your pardon,
Sir—if Segismund,
My cousin, whom I shall
rejoice to hail
As Prince of Poland
too, as you propose,
Be to a trial coming
upon which
More, as I think, than
life itself depends,
Why, Sir, with sleep-disorder’d
senses brought
To this uncertain contest
with his stars?
King. Well ask’d indeed! As wisely be it answer’d! Because it is uncertain, see you not? For as I think I can discern between The sudden flaws of a sleep-startled man, And of the savage thing we have to dread; If but bewilder’d, dazzled, and uncouth, As might the sanest and the civilest In circumstance so strange—nay, more than that, If moved to any out-break short of blood, All shall be well with him; and how much more, If ’mid the magic turmoil of the change, He shall so calm a resolution show As scarce to reel beneath so great a blow! But if with savage passion uncontroll’d He lay about him like the brute foretold, And must as suddenly be caged again; Then what redoubled anguish and despair, From that brief flash of blissful liberty Remitted—and for ever—to his chain! Which so much less, if on the stage of glory Enter’d and exited through such a door Of sleep as makes a dream of all between.
EST.
Oh kindly answer, Sir,
to question that
To charitable courtesy
less wise
Might call for pardon
rather! I shall now
Gladly, what, uninstructed,
loyally
I should have waited.
Ast.
Your Highness doubts
not me,
Nor how my heart follows
my cousin’s lips,
Whatever way the doubtful
balance fall,
Still loyal to your
bidding.
OMNES.
So say all.
King.
I hoped, and did expect,
of all no less—
And sure no sovereign
ever needed more
From all who owe him
love or loyalty.
For what a strait of
time I stand upon,
When to this issue not
alone I bring
My son your Prince,
but e’en myself your King:
And, whichsoever way
for him it turn,
Of less than little
honour to myself.
For if this coming trial
justify
My thus withholding
from my son his right,
Is not the judge himself
justified in
The father’s shame?
And if the judge proved wrong,
My son withholding from
his right thus long,
Shame and remorse to
judge and father both:
Unless remorse and shame
together drown’d
In having what I flung
for worthless found.
But come—already
weary with your travel,
And ill refresh’d
by this strange history,
Until the hours that
draw the sun from heaven
Exeunt.
Scene I—A Throne-room in the Palace. Music within.
(Enter King and Clotaldo, meeting a Lord in waiting)
King.
You, for a moment beckon’d
from your office,
Tell me thus far how
goes it. In due time
The potion left him?
Lord.
At the very hour
To which your Highness
temper’d it. Yet not
So wholly but some lingering
mist still hung
About his dawning senses—which
to clear,
We fill’d and
handed him a morning drink
With sleep’s specific
antidote suffused;
And while with princely
raiment we invested
What nature surely modell’d
for a Prince—
All but the sword—as
you directed—
King.
Ay—
Lord.
If not too loudly, yet
emphatically
Still with the title
of a Prince address’d him.
King.
How bore he that?
Lord.
With all the rest, my
liege,
I will not say so like
one in a dream
As one himself misdoubting
that he dream’d.
King.
So far so well, Clotaldo,
either way,
And best of all if tow’rd
the worse I dread.
But yet no violence?
Lord.
At most, impatience;
Wearied perhaps with
importunities
We yet were bound to
offer.
King.
Oh, Clotaldo!
Though thus far well,
yet would myself had drunk
The potion he revives
from! such suspense
Crowds all the pulses
of life’s residue
Into the present moment;
and, I think,
Whichever way the trembling
scale may turn,
Will leave the crown
of Poland for some one
To wait no longer than
the setting sun!
CLO.
Courage, my liege!
The curtain is undrawn,
And each must play his
part out manfully,
Leaving the rest to
heaven.
King.
Whose written words
If I should misinterpret
or transgress!
But as you say—
(To the Lord, who exit.)
You, back to him at
once;
Clotaldo, you, when
he is somewhat used
To the new world of
which they call him Prince,
Where place and face,
and all, is strange to him,
With your known features
and familiar garb
Shall then, as chorus
to the scene, accost him,
And by such earnest
of that old and too
Familiar world, assure
him of the new.
Last in the strange
procession, I myself
(Exeunt King and Clotaldo.)
Segismund (within).
Forbear! I stifle
with your perfume! Cease
Your crazy salutations!
peace, I say
Begone, or let me go,
ere I go mad
With all this babble,
mummery, and glare,
For I am growing dangerous—Air!
room! air!—
(He rushes in.
Music ceases.)
Oh but to save the reeling
brain from wreck
With its bewilder’d
senses!
(He covers his eyes
for a while.)
What! E’en
now
That Babel left behind
me, but my eyes
Pursued by the same
glamour, that—unless
Alike bewitch’d
too—the confederate sense
Vouches for palpable:
bright-shining floors
That ring hard answer
back to the stamp’d heel,
And shoot up airy columns
marble-cold,
That, as they climb,
break into golden leaf
And capital, till they
embrace aloft
In clustering flower
and fruitage over walls
Hung with such purple
curtain as the West
Fringes with such a
gold; or over-laid
With sanguine-glowing
semblances of men,
Each in his all but
living action busied,
Or from the wall they
look from, with fix’d eyes
Pursuing me; and one
most strange of all
That, as I pass’d
the crystal on the wall,
Look’d from it—left
it—and as I return,
Returns, and looks me
face to face again—
Unless some false reflection
of my brain,
The outward semblance
of myself—Myself?
How know that tawdry
shadow for myself,
But that it moves as
I move; lifts his hand
With mine; each motion
echoing so close
The immediate suggestion
of the will
In which myself I recognize—Myself!—
What, this fantastic
Segismund the same
Who last night, as for
all his nights before,
Lay down to sleep in
wolf-skin on the ground
In a black turret which
the wolf howl’d round,
And woke again upon
a golden bed,
Round which as clouds
about a rising sun,
In scarce less glittering
caparison,
Gather’d gay shapes
that, underneath a breeze
Of music, handed him
upon their knees
The wine of heaven in
a cup of gold,
And still in soft melodious
under-song
Hailing me Prince of
Poland!—’Segismund,’
They said, ‘Our
Prince! The Prince of Poland!’ and
Again, ’Oh, welcome,
welcome, to his own,
‘Our own Prince
Segismund—’
Oh, but a blast—
One blast of the rough
(He has seated himself
on the throne.
Enter Chamberlain, with
lords in waiting.)
CHAMB.
I rejoice
That unadvised of any
but the voice
Of royal instinct in
the blood, your Highness
Has ta’en the
chair that you were born to fill.
Seg.
The chair?
CHAMB.
The royal throne of
Poland, Sir,
Which may your Royal
Highness keep as long
As he that now rules
from it shall have ruled
When heaven has call’d
him to itself.
Seg.
When he?—
CHAMB.
Your royal father, King
Basilio, Sir.
Seg.
My royal father—King
Basilio.
You see I answer but
as Echo does,
Not knowing what she
listens or repeats.
This is my throne—this
is my palace—Oh,
But this out of the
window?—
CHAMB.
Warsaw, Sir,
Your capital—
Seg.
And all the moving people?
CHAMB.
Your subjects and your
vassals like ourselves.
Seg.
Ay, ay—my
subjects—in my capital—
Warsaw—and
I am Prince of it—You see
It needs much iteration
to strike sense
Into the human echo.
CHAMB.
Left awhile
In the quick brain,
the word will quickly to
Full meaning blow.
Seg.
You think so?
CHAMB.
And meanwhile
Lest our obsequiousness,
which means no worse
Than customary honour
to the Prince
We most rejoice to welcome,
trouble you,
Should we retire again?
or stand apart?
Or would your Highness
have the music play
Again, which meditation,
as they say,
So often loves to float
upon?
Seg.
The music?
No—yes—perhaps
the trumpet—
(Aside)
Yet if that
Brought back the troop!
A lord.
The trumpet! There
again
How trumpet-like spoke
out the blood of Poland!
CHAMB.
Before the morning is
far up, your Highness
Will have the trumpet
marshalling your soldiers
Under the Palace windows.
Seg.
Ah, my soldiers—
My soldiers—not
black-vizor’d?—
CHAMB.
Sir?
Seg.
No matter.
But—one thing—for
a moment—in your ear—
Do you know one Clotaldo?
CHAMB.
Oh, my Lord,
He and myself together,
I may say,
Although in different
vocations,
Have silver’d
in your royal father’s service;
And, as I trust, with
both of us a few
White hairs to fall
in yours.
Seg.
Well said, well said!
Basilio, my father—well—Clotaldo
Is he my kinsman too?
CHAMB.
Oh, my good Lord,
A General simply in
your Highness’ service,
Than whom your Highness
has no trustier.
Seg.
Ay, so you said before,
I think. And you
With that white wand
of yours—
Why, now I think on’t,
I have read of such
A silver-hair’d
magician with a wand,
Who in a moment, with
a wave of it,
Turn’d rags to
jewels, clowns to emperors,
By some benigner magic
than the stars
Spirited poor good people
out of hand
From all their woes;
in some enchanted sleep
Carried them off on
cloud or dragon-back
Over the mountains,
over the wide Deep,
And set them down to
wake in Fairyland.
CHAMB.
Oh, my good Lord, you
laugh at me—and I
Right glad to make you
laugh at such a price:
You know me no enchanter:
if I were,
I and my wand as much
as your Highness’,
As now your chamberlain—
Seg.
My chamberlain?—
And these that follow
you?—
CHAMB.
On you, my Lord,
Your Highness’
lords in waiting.
Seg.
Lords in waiting.
Well, I have now learn’d
to repeat, I think,
If only but by rote—This
is my palace,
And this my throne—which
unadvised—And that
Out of the window there
my Capital;
And all the people moving
up and down
My subjects and my vassals
like yourselves,
My chamberlain—and
lords in waiting—and
Clotaldo—and
Clotaldo?—
You are an aged, and
seem a reverend man—
You do not—though
his fellow-officer—
You do not mean to mock
me?
CHAMB.
Oh, my Lord!
Seg.
Well then—If
no magician, as you say,
Yet setting me a riddle,
that my brain,
With all its senses
whirling, cannot solve,
Yourself or one of these
with you must answer—
How I—that
only last night fell asleep
Not knowing that the
very soil of earth
I lay down—chain’d—to
sleep upon was Poland—
Awake to find myself
the Lord of it,
With Lords, and Generals,
and Chamberlains,
And ev’n my very
Gaoler, for my vassals!
Enter suddenly Clotaldo
Clotaldo.
Stand all aside
That I may put into
his hand the clue
To lead him out of this
amazement. Sir,
Vouchsafe your Highness
from my bended knee
Receive my homage first.
Seg.
Clotaldo! What,
At last—his
old self—undisguised where all
Is masquerade—to
end it!—You kneeling too!
What! have the stars
you told me long ago
Laid that old work upon
you, added this,
That, having chain’d
your prisoner so long,
You loose his body now
to slay his wits,
Dragging him—how
I know not—whither scarce
I understand—dressing
him up in all
This frippery, with
your dumb familiars
Disvizor’d, and
their lips unlock’d to lie,
Calling him Prince and
King, and, madman-like,
Setting a crown of straw
upon his head?
CLO.
Would but your Highness,
as indeed I now
Must call you—and
upon his bended knee
Never bent Subject more
devotedly—
However all about you,
and perhaps
You to yourself incomprehensiblest,
But rest in the assurance
of your own
Sane waking senses,
by these witnesses
Attested, till the story
of it all,
Of which I bring a chapter,
be reveal’d,
Assured of all you see
and hear as neither
Madness nor mockery—
Seg.
What then?
CLO.
All it seems:
This palace with its
royal garniture;
This capital of which
it is the eye,
With all its temples,
marts, and arsenals;
This realm of which
this city is the head,
With all its cities,
villages, and tilth,
Its armies, fleets,
and commerce; all your own;
And all the living souls
that make them up,
From those who now,
and those who shall, salute you,
Down to the poorest
peasant of the realm,
Your subjects—Who,
though now their mighty voice
Sleeps in the general
body unapprized,
Wait but a word from
those about you now
To hail you Prince of
Poland, Segismund.
Seg.
All this is so?
CLO.
As sure as anything
Is, or can be.
Seg.
You swear it on the
faith
You taught me—elsewhere?—
CLO (kissing the hilt of his sword). Swear it upon this Symbol, and champion of the holy faith I wear it to defend.
Seg (to himself).
My eyes have not deceived
me, nor my ears,
With this transfiguration,
nor the strain
Of royal welcome that
arose and blew,
Breathed from no lying
lips, along with it.
For here Clotaldo comes,
his own old self,
Who, if not Lie and
phantom with the rest—
(Aloud)
Well, then, all this
is thus.
For have not these fine
people told me so,
And you, Clotaldo, sworn
it? And the Why
And Wherefore are to
follow by and bye!
And yet—and
yet—why wait for that which you
Who take your oath on
it can answer—and
Indeed it presses hard
upon my brain—
What I was asking of
these gentlemen
When you came in upon
us; how it is
That I—the
Segismund you know so long
No longer than the sun
that rose to-day
Rose—and
from what you know—
Rose to be Prince of
Poland?
CLO.
So to be
Acknowledged and entreated,
Sir.
Seg.
So be
Acknowledged and entreated—
Well—But
if now by all, by some at least
So known—if
not entreated—heretofore—
Though not by you—For,
now I think again,
Of what should be your
attestation worth,
You that of all my questionable
subjects
Who knowing what, yet
left me where I was,
You least of all, Clotaldo,
till the dawn
Of this first day that
told it to myself?
CLO.
Oh, let your Highness
draw the line across
Fore-written sorrow,
and in this new dawn
Bury that long sad night.
Seg.
Not ev’n the Dead,
Call’d to the
resurrection of the blest,
Shall so directly drop
all memory
Of woes and wrongs foregone!
CLO.
But not resent—
Purged by the trial
of that sorrow past
For full fruition of
their present bliss.
Seg.
But leaving with the
Judge what, till this earth
Be cancell’d in
the burning heavens, He leaves
His earthly delegates
to execute,
Of retribution in reward
to them
And woe to those who
wrong’d them—Not as you,
Not you, Clotaldo, knowing
not—And yet
Ev’n to the guiltiest
wretch in all the realm,
Of any treason guilty
short of that,
Stern usage—but
assuredly not knowing,
Not knowing ’twas
your sovereign lord, Clotaldo,
You used so sternly.
CLO.
Ay, sir; with the same
Devotion and fidelity
that now
Does homage to him for
my sovereign.
Seg.
Fidelity that held his
Prince in chains!
CLO.
Fidelity more fast than
had it loosed him—
Seg.
Ev’n from the
very dawn of consciousness
Down at the bottom of
the barren rocks,
Where scarce a ray of
sunshine found him out,
In which the poorest
beggar of my realm
At least to human-full
proportion grows—
Me! Me—whose
station was the kingdom’s top
To flourish in, reaching
my head to heaven,
And with my branches
overshadowing
The meaner growth below!
CLO.
Still with the same
Fidelity—
Seg.
To me!—
CLO.
Ay, sir, to you,
Through that divine
allegiance upon which
All Order and Authority
is based;
Which to revolt against—
Seg.
Were to revolt
Against the stars, belike!
CLO.
And him who reads them;
And by that right, and
by the sovereignty
He wears as you shall
wear it after him;
Ay, one to whom yourself—
Yourself, ev’n
more than any subject here,
Are bound by yet another
and more strong
Allegiance—King
Basilio—your Father—
Seg.
Basilio—King—my
father!—
CLO.
Oh, my Lord,
Let me beseech you on
my bended knee,
For your own sake—for
Poland’s—and for his,
Who, looking up for
counsel to the skies,
Did what he did under
authority
To which the kings of
earth themselves are subject,
And whose behest not
only he that suffers,
But he that executes,
not comprehends,
But only He that orders
it—
Seg.
The King—
My father!—Either
I am mad already,
Or that way driving
fast—or I should know
That fathers do not
use their children so,
Or men were loosed from
all allegiance
To fathers, kings, and
heaven that order’d all.
(Enter Rosaura suddenly.)
Rosaura.
Fie, my Lord—forbear,
What! a young hand raised
against silver hair!—
(She retreats through the crowd.)
Seg.
Stay! stay! What
come and vanish’d as before—
I scarce remember how—but—
(Voices within. Room for Astolfo, Duke of Muscovy!)
(Enter Astolfo)
Astolfo.
Welcome, thrice welcome,
the auspicious day,
When from the mountain
where he darkling lay,
The Polish sun into
the firmament
Sprung all the brighter
for his late ascent,
And in meridian glory—
Seg.
Where is he?
Why must I ask this
twice?—
A lord.
The Page, my Lord?
I wonder at his boldness—
Seg.
But I tell you
He came with Angel written
in his face
As now it is, when all
was black as hell
About, and none of you
who now—he came,
And Angel-like flung
me a shining sword
To cut my way through
darkness; and again
Angel-like wrests it
from me in behalf
Of one—whom
I will spare for sparing him:
But he must come and
plead with that same voice
That pray’d for
me—in vain.
CHAMB.
He is gone for,
And shall attend your
pleasure, sir. Meanwhile,
Will not your Highness,
as in courtesy,
Return your royal cousin’s
greeting?
Seg.
Whose?
CHAMB.
Astolfo, Duke of Muscovy,
my Lord,
Saluted, and with gallant
compliment
Welcomed you to your
royal title.
Seg. (to Astolfo).
Oh—
You knew of this then?
Ast.
Knew of what, my Lord?
Seg.
That I was Prince of
Poland all the while,
And you my subject?
Ast.
Pardon me, my Lord,
But some few hours ago
myself I learn’d
Your dignity; but, knowing
it, no more
Than when I knew it
not, your subject.
Seg.
What then?
Ast.
Your Highness’
chamberlain ev’n now has told you;
Astolfo, Duke of Muscovy,
Your father’s
sister’s son; your cousin, sir:
And who as such, and
in his own right Prince,
Expects from you the
courtesy he shows.
CHAMB.
His Highness is as yet
unused to Court,
And to the ceremonious
interchange
Of compliment, especially
to those
Who draw their blood
from the same royal fountain.
Seg.
Where is the lad?
I weary of all this—
Prince, cousins, chamberlains,
and compliments—
Where are my soldiers?
Blow the trumpet, and
With one sharp blast
scatter these butterflies
And bring the men of
iron to my side,
With whom a king feels
like a king indeed!
(Voices within. Within there! room for the Princess Estrella!)
(Enter Estrella with Ladies.)
Estrella.
Welcome, my Lord, right
welcome to the throne
That much too long has
waited for your coming:
And, in the general
voice of Poland, hear
A kinswoman and cousin’s
no less sincere.
Seg.
Ay, this is welcome-worth
indeed,
And cousin cousin-worth!
Oh, I have thus
Over the threshold of
the mountain seen,
Leading a bevy of fair
stars, the moon
Enter the court of heaven—My
kinswoman!
My cousin! But
my subject?—
EST.
If you please
To count your cousin
for your subject, sir,
You shall not find her
a disloyal.
Seg.
Oh,
But there are twin stars
in that heavenly face,
That now I know for
having over-ruled
Those evil ones that
darken’d all my past
And brought me forth
from that captivity
To be the slave of her
who set me free.
EST.
Indeed, my Lord, these
eyes have no such power
Over the past or present:
but perhaps
They brighten at your
welcome to supply
The little that a lady’s
speech commends;
And in the hope that,
let whichever be
The other’s subject,
we may both be friends.
Seg.
Your hand to that—But
why does this warm hand
Shoot a cold shudder
through me?
EST.
In revenge
For likening me to that
cold moon, perhaps.
Seg.
Oh, but the lip whose
music tells me so
Breathes of a warmer
planet, and that lip
Shall remedy the treason
of the hand!
(He catches to embrace
her.)
EST.
Release me, sir!
CHAMB.
And pardon me, my Lord.
This lady is a Princess
absolute,
As Prince he is who
just saluted you,
And claims her by affiance.
Seg.
Hence, old fool,
For ever thrusting that
white stick of yours
Between me and my pleasure!
Ast.
This cause is mine.
Forbear, sir—
Seg.
What, sir mouth-piece,
you again?
Ast.
My Lord, I waive your
insult to myself
In recognition of the
dignity
You yet are new to,
and that greater still
You look in time to
wear. But for this lady—
Whom, if my cousin now,
I hope to claim
Henceforth by yet a
nearer, dearer name—
Seg.
And what care I?
She is my cousin too:
And if you be a Prince—well,
am not I
Lord of the very soil
you stand upon?
By that, and by that
right beside of blood
That like a fiery fountain
hitherto
Pent in the rock leaps
toward her at her touch,
Mine, before all the
cousins in Muscovy!
You call me Prince of
Poland, and yourselves
My subjects—traitors
therefore to this hour,
Who let me perish all
my youth away
Chain’d there
among the mountains; till, forsooth,
Terrified at your treachery
foregone,
You spirit me up here,
I know not how,
Popinjay-like invest
me like yourselves,
Choke me with scent
and music that I loathe,
And, worse than all
the music and the scent,
With false, long-winded,
fulsome compliment,
That ‘Oh, you
are my subjects!’ and in word
Reiterating still obedience,
Thwart me in deed at
every step I take:
When just about to wreak
a just revenge
Upon that old arch-traitor
of you all,
Filch from my vengeance
him I hate; and him
I loved—the
first and only face—till this—
I cared to look on in
your ugly court—
And now when palpably
I grasp at last
What hitherto but shadow’d
in my dreams—
Affiances and interferences,
The first who dares
to meddle with me more—
Princes and chamberlains
and counsellors,
Touch her who dares!—
Ast.
That dare I—
Seg. (seizing him
by the throat).
You dare!
CHAMB.
My Lord!—
A lord.
His strength’s
a lion’s—
(Voices within. The King! The King!—)
(Enter King.)
A lord.
And on a sudden how
he stands at gaze
As might a wolf just
fasten’d on his prey,
Glaring at a suddenly
encounter’d lion.
King.
And I that hither flew
with open arms
To fold them round my
son, must now return
To press them to an
empty heart again!
(He sits on the throne.)
Seg.
That is the King?—My
father?
(After a long pause.)
I have heard
That sometimes some
blind instinct has been known
To draw to mutual recognition
those
Of the same blood, beyond
all memory
Divided, or ev’n
never met before.
I know not how this
is—perhaps in brutes
That live by kindlier
King.
Alas! Alas!
Seg.
Your sorrow, then?
King.
Beholding what I do.
Seg.
Ay, but how know this
sorrow that has grown
And moulded to this
present shape of man,
As of your own creation?
King.
Ev’n from birth.
Seg.
But from that hour to
this, near, as I think,
Some twenty such renewals
of the year
As trace themselves
upon the barren rocks,
I never saw you, nor
you me—unless,
Unless, indeed, through
one of those dark masks
Through which a son
might fail to recognize
The best of fathers.
King.
Be that as you will:
But, now we see each
other face to face,
Know me as you I know;
which did I not,
By whatsoever signs,
assuredly
You were not here to
prove it at my risk.
Seg.
You are my father.
And is it true then,
as Clotaldo swears,
’Twas you that
from the dawning birth of one
Yourself brought into
being,—you, I say,
Who stole his very birthright;
not alone
That secondary and peculiar
right
Of sovereignty, but
even that prime
Inheritance that all
men share alike,
And chain’d him—chain’d
him!—like a wild beast’s whelp.
Among as savage mountains,
to this hour?
Answer if this be thus.
King.
Oh, Segismund,
In all that I have done
that seems to you,
And, without further
hearing, fairly seems,
Unnatural and cruel—’twas
not I,
But One who writes His
order in the sky
I dared not misinterpret
nor neglect,
Who knows with what
reluctance—
Seg.
Oh, those stars,
Those stars, that too
far up from human blame
To clear themselves,
or careless of the charge,
Still bear upon their
shining shoulders all
The guilt men shift
upon them!
King.
Nay, but think:
Not only on the common
score of kind,
But that peculiar count
of sovereignty—
If not behind the beast
in brain as heart,
How should I thus deal
with my innocent child,
Doubly desired, and
doubly dear when come,
As that sweet second-self
that all desire,
And princes more than
all, to root themselves
By that succession in
their people’s hearts,
Unless at that superior
Will, to which
Not kings alone, but
sovereign nature bows?
Seg.
And what had those same
stars to tell of me
That should compel a
father and a king
So much against that
double instinct?
King.
That,
Which I have brought
you hither, at my peril,
Against their written
warning, to disprove,
By justice, mercy, human
kindliness.
Seg.
And therefore made yourself
their instrument
To make your son the
savage and the brute
They only prophesied?—Are
you not afear’d,
Lest, irrespective as
such creatures are
Of such relationship,
the brute you made
Revenge the man you
marr’d—like sire, like son.
To do by you as you
by me have done?
King.
You never had a savage
heart from me;
I may appeal to Poland.
Seg.
Then from whom?
If pure in fountain,
poison’d by yourself
When scarce begun to
flow.—To make a man
Not, as I see, degraded
from the mould
I came from, nor compared
to those about,
And then to throw your
own flesh to the dogs!—
Why not at once, I say,
if terrified
At the prophetic omens
of my birth,
Have drown’d or
stifled me, as they do whelps
Too costly or too dangerous
to keep?
King.
That, living, you might
learn to live, and rule
Yourself and Poland.
Seg.
By the means you took
To spoil for either?
King.
Nay, but, Segismund!
You know not—cannot
know—happily wanting
The sad experience on
which knowledge grows,
How the too early consciousness
of power
Spoils the best blood;
nor whether for your long
Constrain’d disheritance
(which, but for me,
Remember, and for my
relenting love
Bursting the bond of
fate, had been eternal)
You have not now a full
indemnity;
Wearing the blossom
of your youth unspent
In the voluptuous sunshine
of a court,
That often, by too early
blossoming,
Too soon deflowers the
rose of royalty.
Seg.
Ay, but what some precocious
warmth may spill,
May not an early frost
as surely kill?
King.
But, Segismund, my son,
whose quick discourse
Proves I have not extinguish’d
and destroy’d
The Man you charge me
with extinguishing,
However it condemn me
for the fault
Of keeping a good light
so long eclipsed,
Reflect! This is
the moment upon which
Those stars, whose eyes,
although we see them not,
By day as well as night
are on us still,
Hang watching up in
the meridian heaven
Which way the balance
turns; and if to you—
As by your dealing God
decide it may,
To my confusion!—let
Seg.
And so—
When the crown falters
on your shaking head,
And slips the sceptre
from your palsied hand,
And Poland for her rightful
heir cries out;
When not only your stol’n
monopoly
Fails you of earthly
power, but ’cross the grave
The judgment-trumpet
of another world
Calls you to count for
your abuse of this;
Then, oh then, terrified
by the double danger,
You drag me from my
den—
Boast not of giving
up at last the power
You can no longer hold,
and never rightly
Held, but in fee for
him you robb’d it from;
And be assured your
Savage, once let loose,
Will not be caged again
so quickly; not
By threat or adulation
to be tamed,
Till he have had his
quarrel out with those
Who made him what he
is.
King.
Beware! Beware!
Subdue the kindled Tiger
in your eye,
Nor dream that it was
sheer necessity
Made me thus far relax
the bond of fate,
And, with far more of
terror than of hope
Threaten myself, my
people, and the State.
Know that, if old, I
yet have vigour left
To wield the sword as
well as wear the crown;
And if my more immediate
issue fail,
Not wanting scions of
collateral blood,
Whose wholesome growth
shall more than compensate
For all the loss of
a distorted stem.
Seg.
That will I straightway
bring to trial—Oh,
After a revelation such
as this,
The Last Day shall have
little left to show
Of righted wrong and
villainy requited!
Nay, Judgment now beginning
upon earth,
Myself, methinks, in
sight of all my wrongs,
Appointed heaven’s
avenging minister,
Accuser, judge, and
executioner
Sword in hand, cite
the guilty—First, as worst,
The usurper of his son’s
(He pauses as the trumpet
sounds as in Act I.,
and masked Soldiers
gradually fill in behind the Throne.)
King (rising before
his throne).
Ay, indeed, the trumpet
blows
A memorable note, to
summon those
Who, if forthwith you
fall not at the feet
Of him whose head you
threaten with the dust,
Forthwith shall draw
the curtain of the Past
About you; and this
momentary gleam
Of glory that you think
to hold life-fast,
So coming, so shall
vanish, as a dream.
Seg.
He prophesies; the old
man prophesies;
And, at his trumpet’s
summons, from the tower
The leash-bound shadows
loosen’d after me
My rising glory reach
and over-lour—
But, reach not I my
height, he shall not hold,
But with me back to
his own darkness!
(He dashes toward the throne and is enclosed by the soldiers.)
Traitors!
Hold off! Unhand
me!—Am not I your king?
And you would strangle
him!—
But I am breaking with
an inward Fire
Shall scorch you off,
and wrap me on the wings
Of conflagration from
a kindled pyre
Of lying prophecies
and prophet-kings
Above the extinguish’d
stars—Reach me the sword
He flung me—Fill
me such a bowl of wine
As that you woke the
day with—
King.
And shall close,—
But of the vintage that
Clotaldo knows.
(Exeunt.)
Scene I.—The Tower, etc., as in Act I. Scene I.
Segismund, as at first, and Clotaldo.
Clotaldo.
Princes and princesses,
and counsellors
Fluster’d to right
and left—my life made at—
But that was nothing
Even the white-hair’d,
venerable King
Seized on—Indeed,
you made wild work of it;
And so discover’d
in your outward action,
Flinging your arms about
you in your sleep,
Grinding your teeth—and,
as I now remember,
Woke mouthing out judgment
and execution,
On those about you.
Seg.
Ay, I did indeed.
CLO.
Ev’n now your
eyes stare wild; your hair stands up—
Your pulses throb and
flutter, reeling still
Under the storm of such
a dream—
Seg.
A dream!
That seem’d as
swearable reality
As what I wake in now.
CLO.
Ay—wondrous
how
Imagination in a sleeping
brain
Out of the uncontingent
senses draws
Sensations strong as
from the real touch;
That we not only laugh
aloud, and drench
With tears our pillow;
but in the agony
Of some imaginary conflict,
fight
And struggle—ev’n
as you did; some, ’tis thought,
Under the dreamt-of
stroke of death have died.
Seg.
And what so very strange
too—In that world
Where place as well
as people all was strange,
Ev’n I almost
as strange unto myself,
You only, you, Clotaldo—you,
as much
And palpably yourself
as now you are,
Came in this very garb
you ever wore,
By such a token of the
past, you said,
To assure me of that
seeming present.
CLO.
Ay?
Seg.
Ay; and even told me
of the very stars
You tell me here of—how
in spite of them,
I was enlarged to all
that glory.
CLO.
Ay, By the false spirits’
nice contrivance thus
A little truth oft leavens
all the false,
The better to delude
us.
Seg.
For you know
’Tis nothing but
a dream?
CLO.
Nay, you yourself
Know best how lately
you awoke from that
You know you went to
sleep on?—
Why, have you never
dreamt the like before?
Seg.
Never, to such reality.
CLO.
Such dreams
Are oftentimes the sleeping
exhalations
Of that ambition that
lies smouldering
Under the ashes of the
lowest fortune;
By which, when reason
slumbers, or has lost
The reins of sensible
comparison,
We fly at something
higher than we are—
Scarce ever dive to
lower—to be kings,
Or conquerors, crown’d
with laurel or with gold,
Nay, mounting heaven
itself on eagle wings.
Which, by the way, now
that I think of it,
May furnish us the key
to this high flight
That royal Eagle we
were watching, and
Talking of as you went
to sleep last night.
Seg.
Last night? Last
night?
CLO.
Ay, do you not remember
Envying his immunity
of flight,
As, rising from his
throne of rock, he sail’d
Above the mountains
far into the West,
That burn’d about
him, while with poising wings
He darkled in it as
a burning brand
Is seen to smoulder
in the fire it feeds?
Seg.
Last night—last
night—Oh, what a day was that
Between that last night
and this sad To-day!
CLO.
And yet, perhaps,
Only some few dark moments,
into which
Imagination, once lit
up within
And unconditional of
time and space,
Can pour infinities.
Seg.
And I remember
How the old man they
call’d the King, who wore
The crown of gold about
his silver hair,
And a mysterious girdle
round his waist,
Just when my rage was
roaring at its height,
And after which it all
was dark again,
Bid me beware lest all
should be a dream.
CLO.
Ay—there
another specialty of dreams,
That once the dreamer
’gins to dream he dreams,
His foot is on the very
verge of waking.
Seg.
Would it had been upon
the verge of death
That knows no waking—
Lifting me up to glory,
to fall back,
Stunn’d, crippled—wretcheder
than ev’n before.
CLO.
Yet not so glorious,
Segismund, if you
Your visionary honour
wore so ill
As to work murder and
revenge on those
Who meant you well.
Seg.
Who meant me!—me!
their Prince
Chain’d like a
felon—
CLO.
Stay, stay—Not
so fast,
You dream’d the
Prince, remember.
Seg.
Then in dream
Revenged it only.
CLO.
True. But as they
say
Dreams are rough copies
of the waking soul
Yet uncorrected of the
higher Will,
So that men sometimes
in their dreams confess
An unsuspected, or forgotten,
self;
One must beware to check—ay,
if one may,
Stifle ere born, such
passion in ourselves
As makes, we see, such
havoc with our sleep,
And ill reacts upon
the waking day.
And, by the bye, for
one test, Segismund,
Between such swearable
realities—
Since Dreaming, Madness,
Passion, are akin
In missing each that
salutary rein
Of reason, and the guiding
will of man:
One test, I think, of
waking sanity
Shall be that conscious
power of self-control,
To curb all passion,
but much most of all
That evil and vindictive,
that ill squares
With human, and with
holy canon less,
Which bids us pardon
ev’n our enemies,
And much more those
who, out of no ill will,
Mistakenly have taken
up the rod
Which heaven, they think,
has put into their hands.
Seg.
I think I soon shall
have to try again—
Sleep has not yet done
with me.
CLO.
Such a sleep.
Take my advice—’tis
early yet—the sun
Scarce up above the
mountain; go within,
And if the night deceived
you, try anew
With morning; morning
dreams they say come true.
Seg.
Oh, rather pray for
me a sleep so fast
As shall obliterate
dream and waking too.
(Exit into the tower.)
CLO.
So sleep; sleep fast:
and sleep away those two
Night-potions, and the
waking dream between
Which dream thou must
believe; and, if to see
Again, poor Segismund!
that dream must be.—
And yet, and yet, in
these our ghostly lives,
Half night, half day,
half sleeping, half awake,
How if our waking life,
like that of sleep,
Be all a dream in that
eternal life
To which we wake not
till we sleep in death?
How if, I say, the senses
we now trust
For date of sensible
comparison,—
Ay, ev’n the Reason’s
self that dates with them,
Should be in essence
or intensity
Hereafter so transcended,
and awake
To a perceptive subtlety
so keen
As to confess themselves
befool’d before,
In all that now they
will avouch for most?
One man—like
this—but only so much longer
As life is longer than
a summer’s day,
Believed himself a king
upon his throne,
And play’d at
hazard with his fellows’ lives,
Who cheaply dream’d
away their lives to him.
The sailor dream’d
of tossing on the flood:
The soldier of his laurels
grown in blood:
The lover of the beauty
that he knew
Must yet dissolve to
dusty residue:
The merchant and the
miser of his bags
Of finger’d gold;
the beggar of his rags:
And all this stage of
earth on which we seem
Such busy actors, and
the parts we play’d,
Substantial as the shadow
of a shade,
And Dreaming but a dream
within a dream!
Fife.
Was it not said, sir,
By some philosopher
as yet unborn,
That any chimney-sweep
who for twelve hours
Dreams himself king
is happy as the king
Who dreams himself twelve
hours a chimney-sweep?
CLO.
A theme indeed for wiser
heads than yours
To moralize upon—How
came you here?—
Fife.
Not of my own will,
I assure you, sir.
No matter for myself:
but I would know
About my mistress—I
mean, master—
CLO.
Oh, Now I remember—Well,
your master-mistress
Is well, and deftly
on its errand speeds,
As you shall—if
you can but hold your tongue.
Can you?
Fife.
I’d rather be
at home again.
CLO.
Where you shall be the
quicker if while here
You can keep silence.
Fife.
I may whistle, then?
Which by the virtue
of my name I do,
And also as a reasonable
test
Of waking sanity—
CLO.
Well, whistle then;
And for another reason
you forgot,
That while you whistle,
you can chatter not.
Only remember—if
you quit this pass—
Fife.
(His rhymes are out,
or he had call’d it spot)—
CLO.
A bullet brings you
to.
I must forthwith to
court to tell the King
The issue of this lamentable
day,
That buries all his
hope in night.
(To Fife.)
Farewell. Remember.
Fife.
But a moment—but
a word!
When shall I see my
mis—mas—
CLO.
Be content:
All in good time; and
then, and not before,
Never to miss your master
any more.
(Exit.)
Fife.
Such talk of dreaming—dreaming—I
begin
To doubt if I be dreaming
I am Fife,
Who with a lad who call’d
herself a boy
Because—I
doubt there’s some confusion here—
He wore no petticoat,
came on a time
Riding from Muscovy
on half a horse,
Who must have dreamt
she was a horse entire,
To cant me off upon
my hinder face
Under this tower, wall-eyed
and musket-tongued,
With sentinels a-pacing
up and down,
Crying All’s well
when all is far from well,
All the day long, and
all the night, until
I dream—if
what is dreaming be not waking—
Of bells a-tolling and
processions rolling
With candles, crosses,
banners, San-benitos,
Of which I wear the
flamy-finingest,
Through streets and
places throng’d with fiery faces
To some back platform—
Oh, I shall take a fire
into my hand
With thinking of my
own dear Muscovy—
Only just over that
Sierra there,
By which we tumbled
headlong into—No-land.
Now, if without a bullet
after me,
I could but get a peep
of my old home
Perhaps of my own mule
to take me there—
All’s still—perhaps
the gentlemen within
Are dreaming it is night
behind their masks—
God send ’em a
good nightmare!—Now then—Hark!
Voices—and
up the rocks—and armed men
Climbing like cats—Puss
in the corner then.
(He hides.)
(Enter Soldiers cautiously up the rocks.)
Captain.
This is the frontier
pass, at any rate,
Where Poland ends and
Muscovy begins.
Soldier.
We must be close upon
the tower, I know,
That half way up the
mountain lies ensconced.
Capt.
How know you that?
Sol.
He told me so—the
Page
Who put us on the scent.
Sol. 2.
And, as I think,
Will soon be here to
run it down with us.
Capt.
Meantime, our horses
on these ugly rocks
Useless, and worse than
useless with their clatter—
Leave them behind, with
one or two in charge,
And softly, softly,
softly.
Soldiers.
—There it
is!
—There what?
—The tower—the
fortress—
—That the
tower!—
—That mouse-trap!
We could pitch it down the rocks
With our own hands.
—The rocks
it hangs among
Dwarf its proportions
and conceal its strength;
Larger and stronger
than you think.
—No matter;
No place for Poland’s
Prince to be shut up in.
At it at once!
Capt.
No—no—I
tell you wait—
Till those within give
signal. For as yet
We know not who side
with us, and the fort
Is strong in man and
musket.
Sol.
Shame to wait
For odds with such a
cause at stake.
Capt.
Because
Of such a cause at stake
we wait for odds—
For if not won at once,
for ever lost:
For any long resistance
on their part
Would bring Basilio’s
force to succour them
Ere we had rescued him
we come to rescue.
So softly, softly, softly,
still—
A soldier (discovering
Fife).
Hilloa!
Soldiers.
—Hilloa!
Here’s some one skulking—
—Seize and
gag him!
—Stab him
at once, say I: the only way
To make all sure.
—Hold, every
man of you!
And down upon your knees!—Why,
’tis the Prince!
—The Prince!—
—Oh, I should
know him anywhere,
And anyhow disguised.
—But the
Prince is chain’d.
—And of a
loftier presence—
—’Tis
he, I tell you;
Only bewilder’d
as he was before.
God save your Royal
Highness! On our knees
Beseech you answer us!
Fife.
Just as you please.
Well—’tis
this country’s custom, I suppose,
To take a poor man every
now and then
And set him on
the throne; just for the fun
Of tumbling him again
into the dirt.
And now my turn is come.
’Tis very pretty.
Sol.
His wits have been distemper’d
with their drugs.
But do you ask him,
Captain.
Capt.
On my knees,
And in the name of all
who kneel with me,
I do beseech your Highness
answer to
Your royal title.
Fife.
Still, just as you please.
In my own poor opinion
of myself—
But that may all be
dreaming, which it seems
Is very much the fashion
in this country
No Polish prince at
all, but a poor lad
From Muscovy; where
only help me back,
I promise never to contest
the crown
Of Poland with whatever
gentleman
You fancy to set up.
Soldiers.
—From Muscovy?
—A spy then—
—Of Astolfo’s—
—Spy! a spy
—Hang him
at once!
Fife.
No, pray don’t
dream of that!
Sol.
How dared you then set
yourself up for our Prince Segismund?
Fife.
I set up!—I
like that
When ’twas yourselves
be-siegesmunded me.
Capt.
No matter—Look!—The
signal from the tower.
Prince Segismund!
Sol. (from the
tower).
Prince Segismund!
Capt.
All’s well.
Clotaldo safe secured?—
Sol. (from the
tower).
No—by ill
luck,
Instead of coming in,
as we had look’d for,
He sprang on horse at
once, and off at gallop.
Capt.
To Court, no doubt—a
blunder that—And yet
Perchance a blunder
that may work as well
As better forethought.
Having no suspicion
So will he carry none
where his not going
Were of itself suspicious.
But of those
Within, who side with
us?
Sol.
Oh, one and all
To the last man, persuaded
or compell’d.
Capt.
Enough: whatever
be to be retrieved
No moment to be lost.
For though Clotaldo
Have no revolt to tell
of in the tower,
The capital will soon
awake to ours,
And the King’s
force come blazing after us.
Where is the Prince?
Sol.
Within; so fast asleep
We woke him not ev’n
striking off the chain
We had so cursedly help
bind him with,
Not knowing what we
did; but too ashamed
Not to undo ourselves
what we had done.
Capt.
No matter, nor by whosesoever
hands,
Provided done.
Come; we will bring him forth
Out of that stony darkness
here abroad,
Where air and sunshine
sooner shall disperse
The sleepy fume which
they have drugg’d him with.
(They enter the tower,
and thence bring out Segismund asleep on a
pallet, and set him
in the middle of the stage.)
Capt.
Still, still so dead
asleep, the very noise
And motion that we make
in carrying him
Stirs not a leaf in
all the living tree.
Soldiers.
If living—But
if by some inward blow
For ever and irrevocably
fell’d
By what strikes deeper
to the root than sleep?
—He’s
dead! He’s dead! They’ve kill’d
him—
—No—he
breathes—
And the heart beats—and
now he breathes again
Deeply, as one about
to shake away
The load of sleep.
Capt.
Come, let us all kneel
round,
And with a blast of
warlike instruments,
And acclamation of all
loyal hearts,
Rouse and restore him
to his royal right,
From which no royal
wrong shall drive him more.
(They all kneel round his bed: trumpets, drums, etc.)
Soldiers.
—Segismund!
Segismund! Prince Segismund!
—King Segismund!
Down with Basilio!
—Down with
Astolfo! Segismund our King! etc.
—He stares
upon us wildly. He cannot speak.
—I said so—driv’n
him mad.
—Speak to
him, Captain.
Captain.
Oh Royal Segismund,
our Prince and King,
Look on us—listen
to us—answer us,
Your faithful soldiery
and subjects, now
About you kneeling,
but on fire to rise
And cleave a passage
through your enemies,
Until we seat you on
your lawful throne.
For though your father,
King Basilio,
Now King of Poland,
jealous of the stars
That prophesy his setting
with your rise,
Here holds you ignominiously
eclipsed,
And would Astolfo, Duke
of Muscovy,
Mount to the throne
of Poland after him;
So will not we, your
loyal soldiery
And subjects; neither
those of us now first
Apprised of your existence
and your right:
Nor those that hitherto
deluded by
Allegiance false, their
vizors now fling down,
And craving pardon on
their knees with us
For that unconscious
disloyalty,
Offer with us the service
of their blood;
Not only we and they;
but at our heels
The heart, if not the
bulk, of Poland follows
To join their voices
and their arms with ours,
In vindicating with
our lives our own
Prince Segismund to
Poland and her throne.
Soldiers.
—Segismund,
Segismund, Prince Segismund!
—Our own
King Segismund, etc.
(They all rise.)
Seg.
Again? So soon?—What,
not yet done with me?
The sun is little higher
up, I think,
Than when I last lay
down,
To bury in the depth
of your own sea
You that infest its
shallows.
Capt.
Sir!
Seg.
And now,
Not in a palace, not
in the fine clothes
We all were in; but
here, in the old place,
And in our old accoutrement—
Only your vizors off,
and lips unlock’d
To mock me with that
idle title—
Capt.
Nay,
Indeed no idle title,
but your own,
Then, now, and now for
ever. For, behold,
Ev’n as I speak,
the mountain passes fill
And bristle with the
advancing soldiery
That glitters in your
rising glory, sir;
And, at our signal,
echo to our cry,
‘Segismund, King
of Poland!’ etc.
(Shouts, trumpets, etc.)
Seg.
Oh, how cheap
The muster of a countless
host of shadows,
As impotent to do with
as to keep!
All this they said before—to
softer music.
Capt.
Soft music, sir, to
what indeed were shadows,
That, following the
sunshine of a Court,
Shall back be brought
with it—if shadows still,
Yet to substantial reckoning.
Seg.
They shall?
The white-hair’d
and white-wanded chamberlain,
So busy with his wand
too—the old King
That I was somewhat
hard on—he had been
Hard upon me—and
the fine feather’d Prince
Who crow’d so
loud—my cousin,—and another,
Another cousin, we will
not bear hard on—
And—But Clotaldo?
Capt.
Fled, my lord, but close
Pursued; and then—
Seg.
Then, as he fled before,
And after he had sworn
it on his knees,
Came back to take me—where
I am!—No more,
No more of this!
Away with you! Begone!
Whether but visions
of ambitious night
That morning ought to
scatter, or grown out
Of night’s proportions
you invade the day
To scare me from my
little wits yet left,
Begone! I know
I must be near awake,
Knowing I dream; or,
if not at my voice,
Then vanish at the clapping
of my hands,
Or take this foolish
fellow for your sport:
Dressing me up in visionary
glories,
Which the first air
of waking consciousness
Scatters as fast as
from the almander—
That, waking one fine
morning in full flower,
One rougher insurrection
of the breeze
Of all her sudden honour
disadorns
To the last blossom,
and she stands again
The winter-naked scare-crow
that she was!
Capt.
I know not what to do,
nor what to say,
With all this dreaming;
I begin to doubt
They have driv’n
him mad indeed, and he and we
Are lost together.
A soldier (to Captain).
Stay, stay; I remember—
Hark in your ear a moment.
(Whispers.)
Capt.
So—so—so?—
Oh, now indeed I do
not wonder, sir,
Your senses dazzle under
practices
Which treason, shrinking
from its own device,
Would now persuade you
only was a dream;
But waking was as absolute
as this
You wake in now, as
some who saw you then,
Prince as you were and
are, can testify:
Not only saw, but under
false allegiance
Laid hands upon—
Soldier 1.
I, to my shame!
Soldier 2.
And I!
Capt.
Who, to wipe out that
shame, have been the first
To stir and lead us—Hark!
(Shouts, trumpets, etc.)
A soldier.
Our forces, sir,
Challenging King Basilio’s,
now in sight,
And bearing down upon
us.
Capt.
Sir, you hear;
A little hesitation
and delay,
And all is lost—your
own right, and the lives
Of those who now maintain
it at that cost;
With you all saved and
won; without, all lost.
That former recognition
of your right
Grant but a dream, if
you will have it so;
Great things forecast
themselves by shadows great:
Or will you have it,
this like that dream too,
People, and place, and
time itself, all dream
Yet, being in’t,
and as the shadows come
Quicker and thicker
than you can escape,
Adopt your visionary
soldiery,
Who, having struck a
solid chain away,
Now put an airy sword
into your hand,
And harnessing you piece-meal
till you stand
Amidst us all complete
in glittering,
If unsubstantial, steel—
Rosaura (without).
The Prince! The
Prince!
Capt.
Who calls for him?
Sol.
The Page who spurr’d
us hither,
And now, dismounted
from a foaming horse—
(Enter Rosaura)
Rosaura.
Where is—but
where I need no further ask
Where the majestic presence,
all in arms,
Mutely proclaims and
vindicates himself.
Fife.
My darling Lady-lord—
Ros.
My own good Fife,
Keep to my side—and
silence!—Oh, my Lord,
For the third time behold
me here where first
You saw me, by a happy
misadventure
Losing my own way here
to find it out
For you to follow with
these loyal men,
Adding the moment of
my little cause
To yours; which, so
much mightier as it is,
By a strange chance
runs hand in hand with mine;
The self-same foe who
now pretends your right,
Withholding mine—that,
of itself alone,
I know the royal blood
that runs in you
Would vindicate, regardless
of your own:
The right of injured
innocence; and, more,
Spite of this epicene
attire, a woman’s;
And of a noble stock
I will not name
Till I, who brought
it, have retrieved the shame.
Whom Duke Astolfo, Prince
of Muscovy,
With all the solemn
vows of wedlock won,
And would have wedded,
as I do believe,
Had not the cry of Poland
for a Prince
Call’d him from
Muscovy to join the prize
Of Poland with the fair
Estrella’s eyes.
I, following him hither,
as you saw,
Was cast upon these
rocks; arrested by
Clotaldo: who,
for an old debt of love
He owes my family, with
all his might
Served, and had served
me further, till my cause
Clash’d with his
duty to his sovereign,
Which, as became a loyal
subject, sir,
(And never sovereign
had a loyaller,)
Seg.
Oh God, if this be dreaming,
charge it not
To burst the channel
of enclosing sleep
And drown the waking
reason! Not to dream
Only what dreamt shall
once or twice again
Return to buzz about
the sleeping brain
Till shaken off for
ever—
But reassailing one
so quick, so thick—
The very figure and
the circumstance
Of sense-confess’d
reality foregone
In so-call’d dream
so palpably repeated,
The copy so like the
original,
We know not which is
which; and dream so-call’d
Itself inweaving so
inextricably
Into the tissue of acknowledged
truth;
The very figures that
empeople it
Returning to assert
themselves no phantoms
In something so much
like meridian day,
And in the very place
that not my worst
And veriest disenchanter
shall deny
For the too well-remember’d
theatre
Of my long tragedy—Strike
up the drums!
If this be Truth, and
all of us awake,
Indeed a famous quarrel
is at stake:
If but a Vision I will
see it out,
And, drive the Dream,
I can but join the rout.
Capt.
And in good time, sir,
for a palpable
Touchstone of truth
and rightful vengeance too,
Here is Clotaldo taken.
Soldiers.
In with him!
In with the traitor!
(Clotaldo brought in.)
Seg.
Ay, Clotaldo, indeed—
Himself—in
his old habit—his old self—
What! back again, Clotaldo,
for a while
To swear me this for
truth, and afterwards
All for a dreaming lie?
CLO.
Awake or dreaming,
Down with that sword,
and down these traitors theirs,
Drawn in rebellion ’gainst
their Sovereign.
Seg. (about to
strike).
Traitor! Traitor
yourself!—
But soft—soft—soft!—
You told me, not so
very long ago,
Awake or dreaming—I
forget—my brain
Is not so clear about
it—but I know
One test you gave me
to discern between,
Which mad and dreaming
people cannot master;
Or if the dreamer could,
so best secure
A comfortable waking—Was’t
not so?
(To Rosaura).
Needs not your intercession
now, you see,
As in the dream before—
Clotaldo, rough old
nurse and tutor too
That only traitor wert,
to me if true—
Give him his sword;
set him on a fresh horse;
Conduct him safely through
my rebel force;
And so God speed him
to his sovereign’s side!
Give me your hand; and
whether all awake
Or all a-dreaming, ride,
Clotaldo, ride—
Dream-swift—for
fear we dreams should overtake.
(A Battle may be supposed to take place; after which)
Scene I.—A wooded pass near the field of battle:
drums, trumpets, firing, etc. Cries of ’God save Basilio! Segismund,’ etc.
(Enter Fife, running.)
Fife.
God save them both,
and save them all! say I!—
Oh—what hot
work!—Whichever way one turns
The whistling bullet
at one’s ears—I’ve drifted
Far from my mad young—master—whom
I saw
Tossing upon the very
crest of battle,
Beside the Prince—God
save her first of all!
With all my heart I
say and pray—and so
Commend her to His keeping—bang!—bang!—bang!
And for myself—scarce
worth His thinking of—
I’ll see what
I can do to save myself
Behind this rock, until
the storm blows over.
(Skirmishes, shouts,
firing, etc. After some time enter King
Basilio,
Astolfo, and Clotaldo)
King.
The day is lost!
Ast.
Do not despair—the
rebels—
King.
Alas! the vanquish’d
only are the rebels.
Clotaldo.
Ev’n if this battle
lost us, ’tis but one
Gain’d on their
side, if you not lost in it;
Another moment and too
late: at once
Take horse, and to the
capital, my liege,
Where in some safe and
holy sanctuary
Save Poland in your
person.
Ast.
Be persuaded:
You know your son:
have tasted of his temper;
At his first onset threatening
unprovoked
The crime predicted
for his last and worst.
How whetted now with
such a taste of blood,
And thus far conquest!
King.
Ay, and how he fought!
Oh how he fought, Astolfo;
ranks of men
Falling as swathes of
grass before the mower;
I could but pause to
gaze at him, although,
Like the pale horseman
of the Apocalypse,
Each moment brought
him nearer—Yet I say,
I could but pause and
gaze on him, and pray
Poland had such a warrior
for her king.
Ast.
The cry of triumph on
the other side
Gains ground upon us
here—there’s but a moment
For you, my liege, to
do, for me to speak,
Who back must to the
field, and what man may
Do, to retrieve the
fortune of the day.
(Firing.)
Fife (falling forward,
shot).
Oh, Lord, have mercy
on me.
King.
What a shriek—
Oh, some poor creature
wounded in a cause
Perhaps not worth the
loss of one poor life!—
So young too—and
no soldier—
Fife.
A poor lad,
Who choosing play at
hide and seek with death,
Just hid where death
just came to look for him;
For there’s no
place, I think, can keep him out,
Once he’s his
eye upon you. All grows dark—
You glitter finely too—Well—we
are dreaming
But when the bullet’s
off—Heaven save the mark!
So tell my mister—mastress—
(Dies.)
King.
Oh God! How this
poor creature’s ignorance
Confounds our so-call’d
wisdom! Even now
When death has stopt
his lips, the wound through which
His soul went out, still
with its bloody tongue
Preaching how vain our
struggle against fate!
(Voices within).
After them! After
them! This way! This way!
The day is ours—Down
with Basilio, etc.
Ast.
Fly, sir—
King.
And slave-like flying
not out-ride
The fate which better
like a King abide!
(Enter Segismund, Rosaura, Soldiers, etc.)
Seg.
Where is the King?
King (prostrating
himself).
Behold him,—by
this late
Anticipation of resistless
fate,
Thus underneath your
feet his golden crown,
And the white head that
wears it, laying down,
His fond resistance
hope to expiate.
Seg.
Princes and warriors
of Poland—you
That stare on this unnatural
sight aghast,
Listen to one who, Heaven-inspired
to do
What in its secret wisdom
Heaven forecast,
By that same Heaven
instructed prophet-wise
To justify the present
in the past.
What in the sapphire
volume of the skies
Is writ by God’s
own finger misleads none,
But him whose vain and
misinstructed eyes,
They mock with misinterpretation,
Or who, mistaking what
he rightly read,
Ill commentary makes,
or misapplies
Thinking to shirk or
thwart it. Which has done
The wisdom of this venerable
head;
Who, well provided with
the secret key
To that gold alphabet,
himself made me,
Himself, I say, the
savage he fore-read
Fate somehow should
be charged with; nipp’d the growth
Of better nature in
constraint and sloth,
That only bring to bear
the seed of wrong
And turn’d the
stream to fury whose out-burst
Had kept his lawful
channel uncoerced,
And fertilized the land
he flow’d along.
Then like to some unskilful
duellist,
Who having over-reached
himself pushing too hard
His foe, or but a moment
off his guard—
What odds, when Fate
is one’s antagonist!—
Nay, more, this royal
father, self-dismay’d
At having Fate against
himself array’d,
Upon himself the very
King.
Oh, Segismund, in whom
I see indeed,
Out of the ashes of
my self-extinction
A better self revive;
if not beneath
Your feet, beneath your
better wisdom bow’d,
The Sovereignty of Poland
I resign,
With this its golden
symbol; which if thus
Saved with its silver
head inviolate,
Shall nevermore be subject
to decline;
But when the head that
it alights on now
Falls honour’d
by the very foe that must,
As all things mortal,
lay it in the dust,
Shall star-like shift
to his successor’s brow.
(Shouts, trumpets, etc. God save King Segismund!)
Seg.
For what remains—
As for my own, so for
my people’s peace,
Astolfo’s and
Estrella’s plighted hands
I disunite, and taking
hers to mine,
His to one yet more
dearly his resign.
(Shouts, etc. God save Estrella, Queen of Poland!)
Seg (to Clotaldo).
You
That with unflinching
duty to your King,
Till countermanded by
the mightier Power,
Have held your Prince
a captive in the tower,
Henceforth as strictly
guard him on the throne
No less my people’s
keeper than my own.
You stare upon me all,
amazed to hear
The word of civil justice
from such lips
As never yet seem’d
tuned to such discourse.
But listen—In
that same enchanted tower,
Not long ago I learn’d
it from a dream
Expounded by this ancient
prophet here;
And which he told me,
should it come again,
How I should bear myself
beneath it; not
As then with angry passion
all on fire,
Arguing and making a
distemper’d soul;
But ev’n with
justice, mercy, self-control,